Special Announcement: A New Book by Anthony Vaver Will Be Published By Pickpocket Publishing

My new book, Bound with an Iron Chain: The Untold Story of How the British Transported 50,000 Convicts to Colonial America will be published by Pickpocket Publishing in the early summer of 2011.

In the 18th century, thousands of British convicts were separated from their families, chained together in the hold of a ship, and carried off to America, sometimes for the theft of only a handkerchief. Why did these people risk committing such petty crimes when they knew they could be forcibly shipped off to a foreign land if caught? And what happened to them once they arrived in America? Did they prosper under conditions of unlimited opportunity, or were they ostracized by American colonists?

Bound with an Iron Chain reveals this forgotten chapter in American history through the stories of petty thieves, criminal kingpins, frustrated government officials, greedy merchants, and wealthy plantation owners, and it finally shines light on the critical role that convict transportation played in the development of colonial America.

The book also includes a helpful appendix with tips on researching individual convicts transported to America.

About the author

Anthony Vaver has broad expertise in the social and cultural history of crime and punishment and is the author of the Amazon.com bestselling books, Bound with an Iron Chain and Early American Criminals. He holds a Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Stony Brook and an M.L.S. from Rutgers University. He has never spent a night in jail, but he was once falsely accused of shoplifting.
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